JERUSALEM: Israel on Thursday dismantled its last military base in a pocket of the northern West Bank where it had evacuated four small settlements, completing the final stage of a ‘disengagement’ plan.

Hours before the Dotan base was evacuated, soldiers shot dead an unarmed Palestinian man they said entered the installation and ignored their instructions to halt.

The killing was the first of its kind since Israel wound up its pullout of all settlers and soldiers from the Gaza Strip on Sept. 12, the centrepiece of a move to ‘disengage’ from conflict with the Palestinians in Israeli-occupied territories.

An army spokeswoman said the evacuation of Dotan ended a decades-long Israeli presence in the far northern West Bank. But, unlike in Gaza, Israel will retain security control over the northern area with regular armed patrols.—Reuters